Paedophile Teacher 'One Of The Worst Predators'

Child Predator: Husband And 'Popular Teacher'

Updated: 11:44am UK, Thursday 24 April 2014

The serial child predator at the centre of an FBI investigation had a wife and two adult children and was a popular teacher among his students, officials have said.

William James Vahey travelled the world for four decades before his suicide in a Minnesota motel last March.

While teaching, he also served as coach on various school sports teams.

The FBI said he was a "popular and highly respected teacher".

"He had access to children because of his position of trust," said FBI special agent Patrick Fransen.

"He created a system that gave him the opportunity and the means to molest children."

The FBI says he may have carried out child molestation on an unprecedented scale, often drugging his victims.

Vahey told investigators he suffered molestation as a child and went on to prey on boys.

The New York native graduated from California State University, Long Beach, with a Bachelor of Arts in political science, according to a resume cited by the FBI.

He received a master's degree in curriculum development from Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont.

At the time of his death, he was 64, approximately 6ft (182cm) tall, and weighed about 190 pounds (86kg).

He was teaching ninth-grade world history and geography at the American Nicaraguan School in Managua.

Vahey maintained two residences, one in London, where he had taught at an elite school, and another on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, the FBI said.

In 1969, Vahey was arrested in California on six counts of child molestation.

He pled guilty to one count of child molestation and was sentenced to 90 days in jail, followed by five years' probation.

The conviction required Vahey to register with California's sex offender registry for the rest of his life.

However, Vahey eluded that requirement.

Officials said he had not renewed his registration as a sex offender since 1970. He went on to pursue his teaching career in Nicaragua, the UK, Venezuela, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Greece, Iran, Spain, and Lebanon.

His victims are believed to be multinational as many of those schools were attended by the children of American diplomats or military personnel stationed overseas.

Vahey coached boys on middle school, varsity boys' basketball, softball, flag football, and soccer, among other things.

He also served as activities director, student council adviser, cooking club adviser and forensics adviser. 

He often accompanied students on cultural studies or sports trips, the FBI said.

Vahey killed himself two days after agents in Houston sought a warrant to search a computer thumb drive belonging to him.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

South Korea Ferry: All 15 Crew In Custody

A prosecutor investigating the South Korean ferry sinking says all 15 crew members involved in the ship's navigation are now in custody after four more were arrested.

Yang Jung-jin, of the joint investigation team, said two helmsmen and two members of the steering crew were detained this morning.

Eleven other crew members, including the captain, were previously arrested.

All the crew are accused of negligence and of failing to help passengers in need as the ferry sank on April 16.

The captain initially told passengers to stay in their rooms and took half an hour to issue an evacuation order, by which time the ship was tilting too severely for many people to get out.

Meanwhile, officials said divers searching the submerged hull of the ferry found 48 bodies in a room designed to take 38.

Barack Obama and South Korean President Park Geun-Hye bow their heads

At least 35 rooms of the ferry's 111 rooms have been searched so far.

More than 80% of the 302 dead and missing are students from a single high school from the town of Ansan, south of Seoul.

The government has admitted some bodies had been misidentified and announced changes to prevent such mistakes from happening again.

There have been several reports in the South Korean media this week of bodies going to the wrong families, with the error sometimes being identified only after remains had been taken to a funeral home.

An "action plan" released by a government-wide emergency task force acknowledged that there had "been cases where the victims were wrongly transferred".

Divers have recovered 183 bodies so far, but 119 people remain missing feared dead in the dark rooms of the submerged vessel.

A woman at a memorial outside Danwon High School in Ansan

The ferry was on its way from the mainland to the resort island of Jeju when it went down.

President Barack Obama, who has been in South Korea as part of a state visit, offered his condolences for those who had lost their lives.

He presented President Park Geun-hye with an American flag that flew over the White House the day the ship sank.

He said: "So many were young students with their entire lives ahead of them. I can only imagine what the parents are going through at this point, the incredible heartache."

Accepting the flag, Ms Park drew a parallel between the way Americans pulled together after the 9/11 attacks and the resilience of South Koreans following one of the worst maritime disasters in their country's history.

"The Korean people draw great strength from your kindness," she said.

Prosecutors have raided and seized documents at the Korean Register of Shipping and the Korea Shipping Association, which regulates and oversees departures and arrivals of domestic passenger ships.

On Friday night, people in Ansan, where most of the victims came from, gathered to remember those who had died at a candle-lit vigil.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Ukraine Crisis: Russia Vows To Free Observers

It Is No Longer A Game For Separatist Militia

Updated: 12:32am UK, Saturday 26 April 2014

By Sam Kiley, Foreign Affairs Editor in Slavyansk

Their rifles were cocked. The safety catches off. Triggers were fingered. The car lurched to a stop.

Shrill nervous orders were barked in Russian. Men in an assortment of camouflage uniforms lay spread eagled on the roadside glaring down their sights.

A quick search followed. Then a man with a new AK74, probably nicked from the local police station, squinted, his face covered with a balaclava, perhaps attempting a faceless smile.

"Sorry for any inconvenience," he said and waved the car through.

The mixed messages of their behaviour, both aggression and politeness, both bravado and fear, point to a wider conundrum - do they really understand what they're getting in to?

One of their comrades had been shot dead that morning about a mile away on the road out of Slavyansk by an Ukrainian army patrol - probably probing the outer defences of these pro-Russian separatist militants.

Four more, the government said, had been killed in other clashes around the town.

They stand accused of kidnapping the city's elected mayor.

They have taken over city hall and are sandbagging it against an attack and yet they often appear to be no more than young or old boys playing at soldiers.

Occasionally one comes across a trained soldier. Fit and quiet they slink in the background of the occupied buildings.

They may be Russian agents, or former Ukrainian police from the disbanded Berkut who were responsible for sniper attacks on revolutionaries in Kiev.

But the ordinary militants, who are led by local politicians and allegedly funded either by Moscow or allied oligarchs, are clearly being used.

They are the teaspoons the Kremlin is using to keep the east of Ukraine swirling with dark rumours of anti-Russian ethnic cleansing.

Allegations of persecution of pro-Russian groups are entirely false.

But while the militants swagger about the streets, take over government buildings and harass their political opponents, they face a crack down from Kiev.

The nervous men at the road block feared an Ukrainian government attack on the bases in Slavyansk.

They were also facing the reality that what may have felt like a nationalistic camping trip with the added spice of gun play, may no longer be a game.

They may fold under a professional attack by Ukrainian troops.

But if they do not, there will be blood.

And if it flows from Putin's local pawns then so may Russian troops pour in from the east.

He may win, but they will not be around to see his victory.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Russia Wants World War Three, Says Ukraine

Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has accused Russia of wanting to start "a third world war".

Mr Yatseniuk said that Russia wanted to occupy Ukraine "militarily and politically", creating a conflict that would spread to the rest of Europe.

"The world has not yet forgotten World War Two, but Russia already wants to start World War Three," he said.

His comments came as Barack Obama said he would consult key European leaders later on the possibility of imposing new sanctions against Russia.

A pro-Russian separatist fills sand bags at a checkpoint in Slavyansk

Speaking in Seoul, Mr Obama said he wanted to coordinate a united approach with Western US allies.

On the ground, Ukrainian special forces launched a second phase of their "anti-terrorism" operation in the east of the country on Friday.

They mounted a full blockade of the rebel-held city of Slavyansk, an official on the presidential staff said.

Reports that pro-Russian snipers had shot at a Ukranian military helicopter in the eastern town of Kramatorsk have been treated cautiously. 

According to officials in Kiev, the helicopter exploded at a military base after being hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.

Barack Obama will consult European leaders about new sanctions

Its pilot managed to escape but was wounded, the official said. Kramatorsk is one of several under the control of pro-Kremlin gunmen.

Sky's foreign affairs editor, Sam Kiley, in Ukraine, said that the "bellicose" rhetoric between Russia and Ukraine was escalating more quickly than action on the ground.

"On the ground, there are incidents, but the level of violence has been relatively low and does not justify the type of rhetoric we have heard," Kiley said. 

Earlier, US Secretary of State John Kerry accused Russia of "deception" and "destabilisation" in Ukraine and hinted at more sanctions.

John Kerry has warned Russia of 'grave' consequences

Mr Kerry warned Moscow time was running out for it to change course.

"Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia face a choice," he said in unusually blunt language.

"If Russia chooses the path of de-escalation ... all of us will welcome it. But if Russia does not, the world will make sure that the costs for Russia will only grow."

Mr Kerry added this would be a "grave" and "expensive mistake".

He also said the Kremlin has not honoured an agreement aimed at defusing the crisis, echoing earlier comments by Mr Obama.

A checkpoint apparently set on fire by pro-Russian separatists

The Geneva accord between Russia, Ukraine, the US and EU compelled armed groups to put down their weapons and vacate official buildings.

The US says Moscow is stoking unrest and separatist sentiment in the east of Ukraine after its annexation of Crimea.

Russia accuses Washington of encouraging a pro-Western government to adopt anti-Russian policies.

On Thursday, Ukraine's interior ministry said up to five "terrorists" had been killed during an operation to clear checkpoints in the eastern town of Slavyansk.

And seven people were injured overnight at a pro-Ukrainian checkpoint near the Black Sea port of Odessa when an explosive device blew up, police said.

A pro-Russian actvist has his head bandaged

Residents in the town have built several such checkpoints aimed at stopping pro-Russian separatists entering from Moldova's breakaway territory of Transdniestria.

Interfax news agency quoted witnesses as saying a bomb was thrown at the checkpoint from a passing car, though this was not confirmed by police.

Mr Putin has said there will be "consequences" if Kiev has used its army against the activists.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon has warned the crisis is threatening to "spin out of control" and urged all sides to "refrain from violence".

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Israel: Hamas Unity Deal 'Kills Peace Process'

Is Kerry's Mid-East Peace Initiative Finished?

Updated: 9:51am UK, Friday 25 April 2014

By Tom Rayner, Middle East Reporter, Jerusalem

The goal was perhaps unattainable from the outset.

A dream more than a plan.

John Kerry's frenetic diplomatic drive aimed to get Israeli and Palestinian leaders to thrash out the foundations of a final peace deal within nine months.

The deadline was supposed to be next Monday.

Hope of that lies in tatters.

What is worse for Secretary Kerry, is that this wasn't a sudden death.

The negotiations have not experienced a fatal spasm days before a deal - they've been rotting for months.

For weeks, both sides have been waiting to see who could point the finger and say: "There, you see! They didn't want peace in the first place. It's their fault."

Wednesday's announcement of a reconciliation deal between the Fatah party of Palestinian President Abbas and Hamas, gave Benjamin Netanyahu the opportunity to jab the accusatory finger.

The Israeli leader said he will never negotiate with Hamas - the governing power in Gaza, deemed by much of the international community to be a "terrorist organisation".

Abbas had chosen Hamas over peace, Mr Netanyahu said. Talks suspended.

The retort from the Palestinians is that Mr Netanyahu killed the talks long before.

He refused to release a tranche of prisoners and continued to grant permissions for construction of settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank - this, they say, was the moment it all collapsed.

So where does this leave John Kerry?

Deflated, but according to diplomatic sources in Jerusalem, reluctant to walk away.

The reason for this lies in the "constructive ambiguity" of the statements being made by Israel.

The language is tough, but it is not final.

Israel has seen attempts at reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas come and go before.

They know this reconciliation deal could disintegrate as quickly as it emerged.

For now the door remains ajar.

The suspension, therefore, is being seen as a five week hiatus, to see if the proposed "unity government" of Fatah and Hamas ministers can actually be put together.

The hope, particularly for those in the Israeli cabinet supportive of talks, is that the lack of detail in the reconciliation deal will render it unachievable.

For Mr Kerry there is another dimension - that the reconciliation deal may have achieved more than the Palestinians are letting on.

No detail has yet emerged of what reconciliation will mean for the internal security relationship between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

No detail has emerged on whether Hamas prisoners will be freed from Fatah's jails, or on what terms.

No detail has emerged on whether a unity government including Hamas, would stick to the Quartet Principles – the recognition of Israel and renunciation of violence,  which are key to recognition of the Palestinian Authority by the international community.

The answer to whether talks can resume lies in the answers to those questions - the last in particular.

It may be unlikely that Hamas has been coaxed tentatively in from the cold, but until that is clear, Kerry's unattainable dream might have further to run.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Ukraine No Longer A Game For Would-Be Soldiers

Their rifles were cocked. The safety catches off. Triggers were fingered. The car lurched to a stop.

Shrill nervous orders were barked in Russian. Men in an assortment of camouflage uniforms lay spread eagled on the roadside glaring down their sights.

A quick search followed. Then a man with a new AK74, probably nicked from the local police station, squinted, his face covered with a balaclava, perhaps attempting a faceless smile.

"Sorry for any inconvenience," he said and waved the car through.

The mixed messages of their behaviour, both aggression and politeness, both bravado and fear, point to a wider conundrum - do they really understand what they're getting in to?

One of their comrades had been shot dead that morning about a mile away on the road out of Slavyansk by an Ukrainian army patrol - probably probing the outer defences of these pro-Russian separatist militants.

Four more, the government said, had been killed in other clashes around the town.

They stand accused of kidnapping the city's elected mayor.

They have taken over city hall and are sandbagging it against an attack and yet they often appear to be no more than young or old boys playing at soldiers.

Occasionally one comes across a trained soldier. Fit and quiet they slink in the background of the occupied buildings.

They may be Russian agents, or former Ukrainian police from the disbanded Berkut who were responsible for sniper attacks on revolutionaries in Kiev.

But the ordinary militants, who are led by local politicians and allegedly funded either by Moscow or allied oligarchs, are clearly being used.

They are the teaspoons the Kremlin is using to keep the east of Ukraine swirling with dark rumours of anti-Russian ethnic cleansing.

Allegations of persecution of pro-Russian groups are entirely false.

But while the militants swagger about the streets, take over government buildings and harass their political opponents, they face a crack down from Kiev.

The nervous men at the road block feared an Ukrainian government attack on the bases in Slavyansk.

They were also facing the reality that what may have felt like a nationalistic camping trip with the added spice of gun play, may no longer be a game.

They may fold under a professional attack by Ukrainian troops.

But if they do not, there will be blood.

And if it flows from Putin's local pawns then so may Russian troops pour in from the east.

He may win, but they will not be around to see his victory.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Gazprom Turns Up Heat On Kiev With $11bn Bill

Russia Has Best Hand In Ukraine Poker Game

Updated: 6:58pm UK, Tuesday 22 April 2014

By By Sam Kiley, Foreign Affairs Editor in Donetsk

If the Ukrainian crisis was a poker game, Russia holds a royal flush, the Kiev government and her allies not much more than a pair. And that's for every hand played, for now.

Since the annexation of Crimea it has been Vladimir Putin's choice as to whether to fold or call or raise and with every round his pot appears to be getting richer.

In the long term, though, Russia knows it could lose heavily.

The question is: When will the Kremlin decide to cash in its winnings and celebrate a return as a world power with a hearty round of chilled vodka at the bar?

US Vice President Joe Biden, on a visit to Kiev, said "time is short" for Russia to make progress on its commitment at Geneva last week to help defuse the crisis in Ukraine by signalling to its proxy militia (and the Russian commandos alongside them) to evacuate the buildings they have seized across the east of the country.

That isn't the view from Moscow - or from the sandbagged municipal centres, where the men in balaclavas, known locally as "the green men", are reinforcing their defences, not tearing them down.

Sure, Russia faces an increase in sanctions from Europe which may bite into an economy already suffering capital flight, inflation and reduced growth.

But Mr Putin knows that more sanctions are going to cut into Europe too - possibly slowing growth and the recovery from recession that in any case is looking fragile.

Individual countries in the 28-member European Union have been conducting analyses of how damaging broad sanctions against Russia would be.

The City of London will be anxious indeed - it runs on the fuel of  "few questions asked" capital injections from oligarchs who have gouged the countries of the former Soviet Union.

"Stop talking and start acting" said the US vice president.

In Donetsk the "meh" from the Kremlin was almost audible.

"No nation should threaten its neighbours by amassing troops along the border. We call on Russia to pull these forces," he said after meeting Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk.

"We have been clear that more provocative behaviour by Russia will lead to more costs and to greater isolation."

In Moscow, once senior officials had figured out who this "Mr Biden" was - a man without portfolio - minds have already been focussed on how to face down the European sanctions which have been threatened now for weeks.

Dmitry Medvedev, the Prime Minister who channels Mr Putin as his avatar, said Russia was already looking for diversified markets for its gas, namely China, and that sanctions threats were a "bluff".

Mr Putin's popularity is soaring up to and over 90% since he grabbed Crimea amid red-faced blustering from the international community.

His generals have harnessed some of the finest chess minds in a game that has left his opponents gasping. The government now enjoys untrammelled authoritarian power.

In Russia the opposition press was silenced before the Crimean operations.

Now the media there and in the east of Ukraine pumps out lies about neo-Nazis running the Ukrainian government in league with the CIA - convincing enough people that backing the pro-Russian separatists, who now only admit to being "federalists", is an existential necessity.

Mr Yatseniuk said Russian special forces are operating in eastern Ukraine to undermine a presidential election due on May 25 and he called on Moscow to pull them out.

"Everything that is now happening in the east and which Russia is supporting is aimed at wrecking the presidential election," Mr Yatseniuk said.

And that is the Kremlin's ace.

In a month's time Ukraine will not be able to hold legitimate elections in the east of the country because the separatists and their Russian sponsors will not let them.

Instead they are threatening to hold referenda in the middle of May - just as in Crimea - which one can confidently predict will result in a huge pro-Russian majority for independence or annexation into the Russian Motherland.

By the end of the month the Kremlin will be able to step up the chaos and divisions - probably even revving the engines of tanks and mobile artillery on the borders to signal that it may rush to the "aid" of "persecuted" ethnic Russians in Ukrainian territory.

This is the point at which it will be in Russia's interests to cash in on the game it has been playing by forcing its own agenda on Kiev, and getting the West to turn its face away from Ukraine's flirtation with formal association with Nato and the EU.

The alternative will be a return to cold war and economic embargo. Ordinary Russian's won't like that – they have got used to Armani.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

FBI Hunts For UK Victims Of Paedophile Teacher

Child Predator: Husband And 'Popular Teacher'

Updated: 11:44am UK, Thursday 24 April 2014

The serial child predator at the centre of an FBI investigation had a wife and two adult children and was a popular teacher among his students, officials have said.

William James Vahey travelled the world for four decades before his suicide in a Minnesota motel last March.

While teaching, he also served as coach on various school sports teams.

The FBI said he was a "popular and highly respected teacher".

"He had access to children because of his position of trust," said FBI special agent Patrick Fransen.

"He created a system that gave him the opportunity and the means to molest children."

The FBI says he may have carried out child molestation on an unprecedented scale, often drugging his victims.

Vahey told investigators he suffered molestation as a child and went on to prey on boys.

The New York native graduated from California State University, Long Beach, with a Bachelor of Arts in political science, according to a resume cited by the FBI.

He received a master's degree in curriculum development from Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont.

At the time of his death, he was 64, approximately 6ft (182cm) tall, and weighed about 190 pounds (86kg).

He was teaching ninth-grade world history and geography at the American Nicaraguan School in Managua.

Vahey maintained two residences, one in London, where he had taught at an elite school, and another on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, the FBI said.

In 1969, Vahey was arrested in California on six counts of child molestation.

He pled guilty to one count of child molestation and was sentenced to 90 days in jail, followed by five years' probation.

The conviction required Vahey to register with California's sex offender registry for the rest of his life.

However, Vahey eluded that requirement.

Officials said he had not renewed his registration as a sex offender since 1970. He went on to pursue his teaching career in Nicaragua, the UK, Venezuela, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Greece, Iran, Spain, and Lebanon.

His victims are believed to be multinational as many of those schools were attended by the children of American diplomats or military personnel stationed overseas.

Vahey coached boys on middle school, varsity boys' basketball, softball, flag football, and soccer, among other things.

He also served as activities director, student council adviser, cooking club adviser and forensics adviser. 

He often accompanied students on cultural studies or sports trips, the FBI said.

Vahey killed himself two days after agents in Houston sought a warrant to search a computer thumb drive belonging to him.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Putin: Ukraine 'Crime' Will Have Consequences

Vladimir Putin has warned there will be "consequences" if Ukraine has used its army against pro-Russian activists in the east.

Ukraine's interior ministry said "up to five terrorists" were killed in clashes during a military operation to clear three checkpoints in the eastern town of Slavyansk on Thursday.

Reuters is reporting Ukrainian forces have now withdrawn.

The Russian President responded: "If Kiev really began to use the army against the country's population... that is a very serious crime against its own people.

Vladimir Putin has warned of consequences

"That is simply a punitive measure that will without question have consequences... including for our inter-governmental relations."

Ukraine announced on Wednesday that it was re-launching a campaign against pro-Russia insurgents occupying government buildings.

The country's military liberated a town hall in eastern Mariupol without any casualties, according to interior minister Arsen Avakov on Facebook.

He also claimed 70 people led by Russian soldiers raided a Ukrainian base at Artemivsk, wounding one soldier.

Ukrainian tanks roll into Slavyansk

Mr Putin's threat of consequences comes just hours after his foreign minister accused the West of instigating a "revolution" in Ukraine as part of a "geopolitical game" against Moscow.

Foreign minister Sergei Lavrov claimed the US and EU were behind the uprising that ousted Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Kremlin president of Ukraine, in February.

"In Ukraine, the United States and the European Union tried to stage another 'colour revolution', an operation to unconstitutionally change regime," the Interfax news agency quoted Mr Lavrov as saying.

"Our Western partners, first and foremost the United States, tried to behave as winners in the Cold War and pretend that one can ignore Russia in European affairs and undertake activities that directly damage Russian security interests."

Sergei Lavrov says the West is behind the Ukraine crisis

Mr Lavrov added that Ukraine was being used as a "pawn in geopolitical game" against Russia.

Meanwhile, Russia's Gazprom has sent an $11.4bn (£6.7bn) gas bill to Ukraine energy firm Naftogaz - five times the original amount.

Earlier on Thursday US President Barack Obama warned Moscow could face "consequences" after accusing the Kremlin of not honouring an international agreement aimed at defusing the Ukraine crisis.

The Geneva accord between Russia, Ukraine, the US and EU called for an end to violence in eastern Ukraine and compelled armed groups to surrender weapons and leave official buildings.

Mr Obama has said further sanctions were "teed up" in case Russia continued to disregard the spirit of the agreement.

"So far at least we have seen them not abide by the spirit or the letter of the agreement in Geneva," said Mr Obama.              

"Instead we continue to see malicious, armed men taking over buildings, harassing folks who are disagreeing with them, destabilising the region, and we haven't seen Russia step out and discourage it."

The West has already issued asset freezes and visa bans targeting Russian officials but has ruled out military action.

More follows...

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More

Battle For Control Of Net Kicks Off In Brazil

The battle for control of the internet enters a new phase today when 850 experts thrash out its future in Brazil.

Last month, the US announced it plans to give up oversight of the way net addresses are distributed.

Now hundreds of government officials, technical experts and academics are meeting at the NetMundial conference in Sao Paulo to discuss who should oversee the worldwide web in future.

China and Russia want the United Nations to have some say over how the internet is controlled, while the US and parts of Europe say it should be at arms-length from government control.

A draft outcome document has been drawn up for discussion, but the final text will not be binding.

The US currently oversees the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann), but is willing to relinquish control by September 2015.

Officials from countries including China, the US and Great Britain will attend the two-day conference, which was due to be opened by Brazil president Dilma Rousseff.

Organisers say every attendee – from academics to government officials - will have an equal voice.

The goal is to agree on principles that could form the basis of later internet governance discussions.

It is expected that despite the non-binding nature of the discussions, an accord will be hard to reach.

18.46 | 0 komentar | Read More